


Hypocrisy and Hippocratic Oaths

by RiaTheDreamer



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Minor Injuries, Set on Chorus, and after, mutual respect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-30
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 20:06:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17230394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RiaTheDreamer/pseuds/RiaTheDreamer
Summary: She was a Doctor. She patched people up.





	Hypocrisy and Hippocratic Oaths

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ConfessionForAnotherTime](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ConfessionForAnotherTime/gifts).



 

“Who,” the man gasped, peculiarly awake for someone with a gaping wound in his side, “are you?”

“I’m Doctor Grey! A Doctor! _The_ Doctor, if I’m allowed to brag, and with a master’s degree in neurosurgery, I believe I am.”

There was a low, deep sound from him – something between a huff of acknowledge and a groan of pain.

When she kneeled down to remove the armor plate, a hand clasped around her wrist. The grip was crushingly strong. He was a soldier, definitely, but so was most of the population by this point.

“What are you doing?” he asked her.

“I’m a Doctor,” she said, very much aware that she was repeating herself, “I patch people up.”

* * *

The man, she found out, was named Locus, and he had saved a squad of soldiers from a Rebel ambush.

“Hired,” General Mura declared.

He was effective. And it felt nice, the change he brought with him. Suddenly it didn’t feel like the army was ready to collapse at any moment. More bases were captured, more attacks were survived, more resources were brought home.

She felt it among the soldiers, too. They were frightened of the man because of his skills, but it was his skills that they both admired and needed.

“An absolute monster,” one of the patients told her as she fixed his arm. “Just what we need! I bet the Rebels are pissing themselves right now.”

But the Rebels grew effective, too, and after Mura, came Kasper. And when he died came Carty. After Carty came Wehnes. Then Phinney.

Then Doyle.

* * *

“What are you doing?”

“Patching her up,” Grey answered without taking her eyes of oozing bullet wound. The patient groaned beneath her hands but kept still. She hadn’t spoken a word so far.

“Why?” Locus demanded to know.

Talking did not disturb her work any longer. She’d learned to ignore potential distractions a long time ago and her multitasking skills had developed through the years.

She remembered her early days as a Doctor, the time where her hands had been shaking with excitement and her head had been filled with medical formulas and oaths.

Do no harm. Years later, she couldn’t help but feel she strayed away from the path.

But it’s in the human nature to fail, and she was saving lives every day now. The cruelty of war suddenly kept her hands busy.

“It is the enemy.”

“It is a teenager,” Grey corrected him and watched how her gloves progressively became red. At this rate, she should just change her armor color entirely! “And a prisoner. And this is a bullet wound that will prove fatal if not treated.”

She knew it was a Rebel, she’d recognized that from the armor. But most importantly: it was her current patient.

“It has been arranged that the Federal Army does not keep prisoners unless absolutely necessary.”

“I am not in charge of that. I am in charge of treating the patients and what you see here is in fact a patient.”

There was silence except for the soft moaning as she dug out the bullet.

“Your work,” he said slowly, “should not go wasted.”

“Exactly! You do your best to remember that,” she said, keeping her voice cheerful. She wasn’t quite sure if it was for the sake of the patient or herself.

Locus left after that.

The morning after, she learned that the prisoners had been executed.

* * *

Locus, she discovered, preferred to tend to his injuries himself.

He didn’t do a bad job. But broken bones tended to be set more straight when another set of hands were doing it, and Grey had seen neater stitches.

“You are remarkably quiet for someone with a dislocated shoulder.”

“Are you not more needed elsewhere?”

“If I were, I wouldn’t be offering my help!” She has expected more of a struggle from him, but all she received was a low huff as he sat down. He stayed silent when she pushed his shoulder back in place.

His eyes were as piercing as she’d imagined, and the scars on his face caused her to wonder, though she never asked her questions out loud.

“I have painkillers.”

“No.”

“I expected that.” She watched him stand, reaching to put the helmet back on his head. “You bring hope to our army, Locus. Hope and fear.”

“I am a soldier.”

She nodded. “And an effective one at that!”

* * *

“Oh dear. Is all that blood yours?”

“No.”

His frown didn’t change as she met his glance.

She didn’t blink, expecting an explanation.

And finally, he tilted his head. “Have you ever tortured someone, Doctor?”

“I’m a Doctor,” she replied and made sure that her smile didn’t crack. “We do no harm.”

* * *

“Retrieving someone,” Grey told him slowly, “does not include knocking a piece of their skull.”

“That is an overstatement.”

“It enhances the understanding.”

There was blood on Locus’ gloves, and he didn’t hesitate to meet her stare.

He didn’t flinch as the Sim Troopers were brought inside on gurneys – bleeding, groaning, unconscious, hallucinating.

It was not the welcome she’d wished to give their new heroes.

“Doctor,” Locus said as he turned away from her, walking down the hallway, “don’t you have patients to patch up?”

* * *

After the battle against Charon, she was tired. It had been almost two days without sleep. Even longer since a proper meal that wasn’t a simple energy bar.

But she’d saved as many as she could and had given everything she had to give.

The Reds and Blues had made it. They had won. The war was over.

These were all good thoughts to go to sleep with.

But as she turned to shut off the light in the laboratory, she heard the sound of metal clattering against the floor. A tray with scalpels had been knocked from the table.

She watched as a glass of pills seemingly floated down from the medical cabinet.

Grey froze.

Then she remembered the tales she’d heard from the Sim Troopers. About Felix. And Hargrove.

And Locus.

Grey didn’t forget, nor did she forgive.

But she had always been very smart, if she was allowed to say so herself.

Grey turned off the light, left the room, and let Locus take what supplies he needed.

* * *

When the calming tunes of opera didn’t soothe her nerves after a particularly bad night, she would sometimes retreat to the hospital yard. From there she could watch the lights of the city and if she craned her neck, she could read the big letters attached to the building.

_GENERAL DOYLE GENERAL HOSPITAL_

It still made her heart ache at the memory but at the same time, her lips would curl into a sentimental smile. How strange emotions could be, especially when playing with memories.

Most nights she would be alone out here.

But not tonight.

“I have to warn you,” she said, spinning around to face the intruder, “if you are here to attack me, you should know I’m armed with several scalpels.”

It took a second before the cloaking was disabled.

The man before her was bleeding onto the tiles.

“How,” he gasped in-between rapid breathing, “did you detect me?”

“Oh, that wheezing breathing is unmistakably a punctured lung! And most patients use the front door.” With a tilted head she looked him over, noting the way he was holding himself up, an arm wrapped around his ribs. “Except Agent Washington, of course. He appeared at the back entrance. Just like you.”

The way his helmet tilted upwards made it clear he caught the hint.

But then again, she hadn’t expected anything else.

Locus said nothing, but his visor was set on her and didn’t move.

“Well,” clasping her hands together, she prepared to take a better look at the injury, “let’s see if we can fix that.”

He didn’t wince as she examined him, but as she turned to fetch the needed medical equipment, a hand rested lightly on her wrist. “You do not have to do this.”

It was strange, how small the former mercenary could look. But that was the fragility of humanity, she supposed, why she was needed to bring people back from the brink of dead.

Do no harm was a hard promise to keep, and Locus seemed to have found a middle way.

Grey could respect that.

“I am a Doctor,” she reminded him, “I patch people up.”

**Author's Note:**

> For ConfessionForAnotherTime! Thank you for the help with my bachelor! I've never written that much for these characters before, I hope I did well!
> 
> Happy New Year tomorrow, folks.
> 
> As always: English isn't my native language and you can find me as riathedreamer on tumblr and twitter.


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